Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Book and paper arts with a 5-year-old

Occasionally, my little boy requests that we make things in my bookbinding studio, and he doesn't mean block towers or Lego towns. Last week he asked if we could make a book. We have made blank notebooks before, just using a basic pamphlet stitch (his first attempt was over two years ago).

This time we found printable booklets online so his book would have real content. The layout of the pages made them perfect for a stab binding, so this time Nicholas made his first Japanese-bound book, called "What begins with N?".

He wanted yet another project, so we made paint. Using a simple recipe that we found online, we made three pots of sticky paint. This is esentially paste made from cornstarch with some food colouring mixed in. The result was a very translucent paint mixture, and when the papers dried, they were very slick and smooth. Could be a great concoction for paste papers.

Thanks Rhonda, good links which I will make use of with the 4 yr old G'daughter. and maybe the 2 yr old as well, she's sure to say 'me too?' I know you're busy and I'm thinking of you - all the best... Carol

my son Leonardo is the same, he loves to stay with me in my studio, and he works on art projects! He he 5 years old and i love to stay with Leo!!sometimes i've to put some photos of Leo's books in my blog!